After the death of Alexander the Great in 323 BCE, a new cultural center emerged in the recently founded city of Alexandria in Egypt. From across the Greek-speaking world, intellectuals who were both scholars and poets flocked to Alexandria's Museion (the shrine to the Muses) and its renowned library to categorize and organize the literature of the past while creating new kinds of poetry and poetic ideals. This course surveys the poetry of Hellenistic period with a focus on the "big three" poets of the third century, Callimachus, Theocritus, and Apollonius of Rhodes, who were especially influential on later Latin poetry of the Republic and Augustan ages. As we read a variety of texts including epigrams, hymns, mimes, pastoral idylls, and selections from epic, we will pay close attention to issues of genre, the tension between tradition and innovation, and the cultural context of Greco-Egyptian Alexandria.

Class Format: seminar

Requirements/Evaluation: based on class participation, shorter written exercises and/or oral reports, midterm and final exams, and a final paper